Saturday, February 22, 2014

The winter is VERY disappointing this year in Israel, and, apart from a week in December, it feels much more like spring than an actual winter. But there are those who enjoy the sunshine, like this Painted Dragon (Stellagama Stellio), who was basking yesterday and today on the rocks near my mother's house in Kiryat Tivon, Israel.

Friday, February 21, 2014

After posting my Dark Nebula variant on the SFRPG-Discussion Boards, I was asked on these boards by the Evil Doctor Ganymede: "Is there a reason that the planets in the Dark Nebula polity aren't inhabited or named?" So here is the answer, which is pivotal to the back-story of my Dark Nebula variant (i.e. non-canonical) official traveller universe.

Experimental Jump Coils on N3

The 2740's (the distant Third Imperium's calendar speaks of the -1770's) were well within the waning years of the Rule of Man, marked by significant political, economic and social instability. The old, stagnant Imperium, with a thin layer of Terran rule superimposed on it, was going to hell in a handbasket. Soon enough, in 2746, the dreaded Twilight, and, later, the Long Night, would engulf known space, leading to almost two millennia of barbarism and decay.

But instability has its perks. The failing Terran Empire was no longer a coherent government body, and those with connections and a clout could apprehend budgets, resources, even whole worlds, and get away with it in the chaos. Research Unit #72 was one such group of people (in this case, scientists) with clout, and, indeed, they managed to appropriate funds - stolen from the decomposing corpse of the Second Imperium - undreamed of by scientists of more civilized times. With that money, they moved to the deep Spinward-Rimward frontier, to the scantly explored Dark Nebula, to be free from the moral and political constrains of the Core. And there they worked wonders. At least, they tried to.

The latter technology reached a place that even the great scientists of the Solomani Confederation were unable to replicate, but at a price. On November 3rd, 2747 AD, The Event occurred. Experimental stationary jump coils on the world known today as N3 fired as part of a planned experiment. But they caused an unexpected effect. In an instant, all five star-systems of the Dark Nebula were torn from their place in the Space-Time Continuum, and hurled, through jumpspace (or a similar parallel dimention), as a whole, not in space, but in time. For a whole year, local time, these systems were in limbo - disconnected from our universe. But then they burst back into Real Space - almost three millennia, in Real Space dates, after their disappearance. For that time, the Nebula was a dead zone - an area of space where no solid bodies could be seen, and where anomalies in the Space-Time Continuum endangered any ship entering that space.

In August 5638 AD (1117 Imperial), suddenly the N4 star of the Dark Nebula appeared on the night sky of Taida Na, re-lighting the old cloud (this means they have appeared in real-space a few years before, as it takes the light of N4 a few years to reach Taida Na). Soon enough, rumours have reached both Solomani and Aslan ears that the worlds of the Nebula, hinted upon in legend, are back. And now, their technological treasures are ripe to the plucking, though still ripe with Space-Time Continuum anomalies, mutated animals, crazed survivors and a mad, mad AI.

Saturday, February 15, 2014

The Czar has deep pockets and he hired the best of the best - an
expensive German mercenary outfit with extensive augmentations - to
combat his NSF foes on the contested world of Novi Stalingrad. These
troops are second to none, and are armed to their cyberteeth, but their
numbers are small.

I have bought the Classic Traveller and JTAS CD-ROMs a few weeks ago, and so far this is an excellent bargain - a huge amount of material for the paltry sum of $35 (plus shipping). This has made me actually interested in the Official Traveller Universe (OTU), or, at least, a variant of it; too much good material to let it pass. On the CT CD there were also the various Traveller boardgames, in PDF format. One of them was Dark Nebula, a proto-traveller war-boardgame with the Solomani (Terran nationalists) set up against the Aslan (felid aliens with a Samurai flavour) over an area of space on the border between these two polities.

The interesting thing is that Dark Nebula presents a version of the Solomani-Aslan border region which is different from future depictions of the OTU Dark Nebula Sector; it is even rotated backwards (in the boardgame, the Solomani are to the Spinward and teh Aslan to the Trailing while in the OTU it is the other way around). It also presented a very interesting area of space.

Turns out that Andy Slack, in his Halfway Station blog, has already made this into a sci-fi setting, using GURPS Traveller and, later on, Savage Worlds and Stars Without Number. His creative application of the setting's features, as well as my discussion with him over his blog's comment system, have gotten my creative juices flowing. Here was an opportunity - a proto-Traveller, quasi-OTU setting ripe for the plucking. On one hand, this is "OTU" - and allows us to use the wealth of material presented by the Classic Traveller and JTAS CD-ROMs; on the other hand, it is non-canonical, so we need not be bound to the stifling limits of Traveller canon.

The Dark Nebula setting is also a perfect sandbox - it has two main polities and several independent worlds, as well as many independent worlds, and distinctions between habitable worlds, non-habitable worlds and systems with no mainworld planets (i.e. asteroid belts). There are enough worlds and enough space for a whole campaign, as Andy Slack has already run there for several years.

So I intend to build this as a potential sandbox as well. Note that my version of the setting is different from Andy Slack's setting, and uses Classic Traveller (CT) as a ruleset; it is set in January 5638 AD (late 1117 Imperial), with the Imperium mentioned only in passing (being very far from the Dark Nebula and a vague version of the MegaTraveller events used as background for the larger scope of things (in this case, Dulinor's coup led to him being Emperor, but some of the Great Houses rebelled and the Solomani used this opportunity of Imperial weakness to launch a lighting attack and liberate the rest of the Solomani Sphere from Imperial control).

Present in my version are mainly Solomani and Aslan humans, as well as two independent pocket-empires usually consisting of a combined Human-Aslan population. A few Droyne are also present.

A Note on Canonicity
Dark Nebula is not canon. I repeat: it is not canon in any way. It is vaguely set in the OTU, but in a variant OTU. Specifically, I use material and even CT adventures in a way suiting this particular version of the setting, sometimes in ways which are very different than those of canon. That is, some adventures set in teh Solomani Rim and the Spinward Marches are placed on this Dark Nebula map.

Legal Stuff
The Traveller game in all forms is owned by Far Future Enterprises. Copyright 1977 - 2014 Far Future Enterprises. Traveller is a registered trademark of Far Future Enterprises. Far Future permits web sites and fanzines for this game, provided it contains this notice, that Far Future is notified, and subject to a withdrawal of permission on 90 days notice. The contents of this site are for personal, non-commercial use only. Any use of Far Future Enterprises' copyrighted material or trademarks anywhere on this web site and its files should not be viewed as a challenge to those copyrights or trademarks. In addition, any program/articles/file on this site cannot be republished or distributed without the consent of the author who contributed it.

Friday, February 14, 2014

I'm working on an army for Tomorrow's War, a New Soviet Federation army. For the most part, this is a conventional land army, with regular infantry, BTRs and tanks, but it also has suits (particularly big and clunky power armour). Eventually I'll have two armies to oppose it, one German Stosstrooper Mercenary army (which is almost ready), and one Imperial Russian army (which I am yet to buy - these would be Khurasan neo-Russians and their DOE gunships for a VDV force).

In fact, my NSF force is composed of two armies: the NSF Guard army, which are a proper Tech Level 2 force (these are Tomorrow's War TLs; in Traveller terms, that would be around TL10-11), and the NSF Opolcheniye (People's Militia), a Tech Level 1 (in Traveller terms, TL8) lighter-infantry force with hand-me-down equipment and less armour. The Guard army will have Lenin MBTs (Combat Wombat Type-123's) and BTR-290's (ArmiesArmy BTRs which I've pre-ordered), as well as a Suit Cavalry squadron (Kremlin Miniatures Rising Sun MANITOUs), while the Opolcheniye will have Lev Davidovich scrap tanks (converted Zvezda T-34's). The Guard troops will be ArmiesArmy RUSKS, while the Opolcheniye will use a combination of 15mm.co.uk Post-Apocalyptic Warriors with Rebel Minis Sahadeen support weapons and command.

Tuesday, February 11, 2014

Bryan Gibson, a Society of Creative Anachronism craftsman, illustrator and artist, reposible, among other things, for the art in many Traveller books, passed away this week from Double Pneumonia. I had the honour to know Mr. Gibson in 2007-2008, unfortunately online only, when working together on some Traveller projects for Avenger Enterprises. He was a fine man, a good person, an excellent illustrator and a great role-player and Referee.

Sunday, February 9, 2014

If I'd ever run an Official Traveller Universe game, which published adventures I'd like to run?

The Argon Gambit/Death Station (DA3). The first is "24" in Traveller, the second is System Shock. Both look very promising; Death Station can be planted anywhere, and Argon Gambit wherever there are Solomani.

Chamax/Horde (DA5). The first is a Bug Hunt, the other is Starship Troopers combined with a 1950s B-Movie. Very promising. Can be easily dropped into whatever campaign area.

Friday, February 7, 2014

After posting my two Visions of Empire a month or so ago, now it's time for a poll: which of them would you like to see developed, or even played? Come and vote!

I'll repeat the visions here for your reading convenience:

Vision #1: These Stars Are Ours!
In this Vision, Humanity has missed its chance to start its own
interstellar state. In the hyper-consumerist 21st century, apart from
some privately-owned space tourist outfits and some abortive attempts at
belt mining, we Humans did not pay much attention to space, preferring
instead to focus on our day-to-day lives here on Earth. Space programs
were cut back, and the single manned Mars landing in 2043 was not
followed by any further exploration. But then the Reticulans came.

In 2082, several Reticulan (more particularly, House Thiragin) capital
ships appeared in Earth orbit, sending a wave of smaller saucers to
hover above Earth's major cities. Soon enough, through promises of
advanced technology and access to vast wealth through interstellar
trade, most Earth governments signed pacts with the alien visitors. In a
matter of months, Earth was transformed from a chaotic collection of
independent states into one big client-state of the Reticulan House
Thiragin, ruled by the Earth Federal Administration (EFA). A few
Earthlings did resist this economic and political takeover, however,
under the umbrella of the hastily-formed Terran Defence Committee (TDC),
which, for several years, launched covert operations against the aliens
and their collaborators, until hunted down and defeated by the EFA's
bio-augmented Federal Security Apparatus (FSA), better known as the Men
in Black.

While self-administered and allowed to build its own armed forces -
mostly to serve as auxiliary troops for House Thiragin - Terra was under
the alien thumb, its economy and resources exploited by the alien
Thiragin, some of its people used by Thiragin scientists as lab-rats for
various bio-tech experiments, and its soldiers send off to fight
distant wars on the behalf of its alien masters. the EFA allowed
relatively little freedom to its citizens, but, on the other hand,
developed its own sphere of space around Earth with nine new colonies
settled by Mankind, exporting goods to the Thiragin monopoly and the
larger Reticulan Empire.

But then, in 2232, Humanity had enough. After a century and a half of
subjugation, massive protests against the EFA's unfair tax burden and
tyrannical practices turned into open rebellion on Terra and the nine
major colonies. Out of the chaos, rose the United Terran Republic (UTR),
which declared itself an independent state, and, soon after, called for
the Reticulans' other thralls and client states to rise up in rebellion
as well, towards a free Interstellar Republic.

The Reticulans responded by trying to crush this impudent uprising,
sending their own Thiragin Huscarls as well as Cicek mercenaries. Thus
began the Terran Liberation War. Stubborn Terran military resistance, as
well as diplomatic efforts, found, however, their success, as parts of
the Cicek hordes broke off from their own, Reticulan-dominated
client-state, forming what was first known as the Cicek Democracy and
later as the Cicek Confederacy. The combined might of Terran troops and
allied Cicek dissidents crushed, in 2239, House Thiragin's might,
breaking through the defensive lines and approaching Zeta 2 Reticuli,
House Thiragin's Sector Capital. Until then, however, the other
Reticulan houses, content to see their Thiragin competitors embroiled in
what was seen as a minor rebellion of barbarians and thus weakened,
have not intervened. Only when UTR and Cicek Confederation troops were
two jumps away from Zeta 2 Reticuli, the Empress herself sent her
Legions, supported by numerous auxiliaries, to crush the rebellion.

Ultimately, they failed. Fighting raged for a decade more, with the
lines moving back and forth between the Terran-Cicek alliance and the
Reticulan Empire, but, in January 2250, the fabled Terran Guard,
supported by Colonial Troops and a heavy Cicek fleet, smashed through
the Reticulan lines, capturing Zeta 2 Reticuli and thus declaring the
entire Reticuli Sector (now Terra Sector) their own.

The Empire had to capitulate. In June 2250, they signed a treaty with
the UTR, recognizing its sovereignty, as well as its conquest of the
Reticuli Sector, and setting up a Demilitarized Zone between the two
states, where ships above 5,000 tons were disallowed to enter (the war
saw ships as big as 50,000 tons in action). Furthermore, Terra forced
the Reticulans' hand into allowing the various minor races of the
Demilitarized Zone to secede, if desired, from the Empire.

Now it is 2258. After two decades of war and eight years of recovery, a
large part of the Terran military is being demobilized. Your characters
were among those who were mustered out (anyone serving 3 or more
Traveller terms have actually fought in the Terran Liberation War!).
Opportunities for civilian, or mercenary life abound in the far reaches
of the Demilitarized Zone. Between petty squabbles of newly-independent
worlds and the two major powers' attempts to covertly exert their
influence into the DMZ, there is a big market for mercs, spies-for-hire,
and, on the other hand, merchants opening up new markets on distant
worlds. Adventures await!

Technologically speaking, the current Reticulan Empire is squarely at
Traveller TL13, the UTR at most at TL12 for civilian applications with
some TL13 military gear (especially starship weapons and Jump-4 military
couriers) and the Cicek TL11 for the most part.

Vision #2: Ashes of the Empire
In this Vision, most earth governments of the early-mid 21st century did
indeed cut deep into their space budgets, preferring to focus on more
terrestrial matters instead. However, space exploration was taken up by
Terran corporations, who saw the new frontier as a means for gaining
vast wealth. And wealth they found indeed. Operating under Terran 'flags
of convenience', they soon found their way into the asteroid belt,
growing rich from its ore. In 2091, a faster-than-light engine, dubbed
the 'Jump Drive', was invented, seemingly simultaneously, by several of
the corporations. Soon enough, they were all over the nearby stars,
exploring and exploiting their resources and colonizing distant planets.

By the mid-22nd century, ten stable megacorporations, each owned by a
single family, arose from this exploration - the so-called Zaibatsus.
Each laid claim to a major slice of explored and unexplored space, and
held a vertical, as well as horizontal, monopoly over the majority of
goods produced and consumed in that slice Inter-corporation trade was
mostly in rare earth elements, radioactives and specialized
technologies. It was by the early 23rd centurt that the Zaibatsus deemed
their old Terran 'flags of convenience' to be an inconvenience
themselves. Ossified and highly monopolized, in 2233 they used their
enormous economic clout to manoeuvre the various Earth governments into
forming Terra's first world-state: the Terran Empire. Upon their
fossilized and highly nepotist corporate machines they foisted
traditional titles from Earth's past, and the richest of all Zaibatsu
families - the Durnhal family - became the Imperial Household. A major
air of nostalgic pseudo-feudal mystique was stirred up by the Great
Houses, with a strong rhetoric of honour and tradition. But, at its
heart, the Terran Empire was a glorified price-fixing scheme, a deal
between monopolies to divide known space between their interests.

For three centuries things went well, with the empire growing and
expanding, making contact with the Reticulan Technate, with the Cicek
Tribes, the Sselessian Hegemony, the Fanja-Kanja Condfederation, the
Ph'noonk Cooperative and the nomadic Zhuzzh. The era between the
Empire's stabilization in 2239 and the Great Stagnation beginning in
2526 was called the Terran Golden Age. While Great House nepotism and
bureaucracy made scientific discoveries slow, trade with the alien
neighbours brought new ideas to Terra, and technology progressed up to
Traveller TL13, albeit in a conservative fashion. Apart from the
occasional border skirmish with alien polities, as well as the growing
threat of piracy, the single greatest military threat to the Terran
Empire was the Matriarchate, a posthuman polity formed by dissident
belters in the far reaches of space, and embraced cybertechnology to the
hilt (unlike the conservative Empire), up to an including creating a
synthetic shared consciousness of their group. And, indeed, the threat
of the utterly alien (though of Human origin) Matriarchate served as a
whip to keep Imperial citizens in line for several generations. The
Matriarchate supremacy in electronic warfare also fuelled the Empire's
technological conservativism, as advanced, integrated computer networks
with wireless capabilities were easy prey for Matriarchate computer
virii.

The Great Stagnation was cooking, in fact, since the mid-25th century.
Ossified, decadent and introverted, the Imperial Core saw innovation as
an inconvenience and progress as a threat. An economy and a society
which is not moving forward, however, is bound to start sliding back. In
2526, the first Great House was forced to declare bankruptcy, an
unprecedented event in Imperial history. Recession set in, and the power
struggles between the Great Houses grew bitter. When Empress Elena II
died an early death in 2539, despite TL13 medical technology, and left
the line with no clear successor, the Empire fell into disarray, with
the Great Houses scrambling to place themselves on the Terran Throne
instead of the dying House Durnhal.

The actual Civil War, and the Terran Revolution which followed, were
actually relatively short. Between 2539 and 2547, brief fire was
exchanged between the major houses, and a major uprising had occurred in
several parts of the Empire, including on Terra itself. But lacking
economic strength to back up their war machines, the remaining Great
Houses, as well as the Republican rebels, were unable to claim a
victory. When the dust settled in 2547, the Terran Republic was no more,
a weak Emperor found his way to the Terran Throne (ruling Terra itself
and a handful of nearby worlds in bad economic shape); only three of the
Great Houses remain in any measurable strength.

Into this vacuum came new forces seeking to gain ascendency from the
chaos. First and foremost, Terran space was invaded by aliens, chief
among them the Cicek, the Sselassians, the Zhuzzh and the Reticulans,
seeking to expand their territories and grow rich from Imperial plunder;
little or no Human forces were able to repel these invasions. Secondly,
local warlords, as well as opportunistic Oligarchs - interstellar
robber-barons feeding on the rotting carrion of the fallen Great Houses -
rose and consolidated their local forces. The Republican armada and its
rag-tag civilian followers, fleeing prosecution and near-defeat in the
Core and the Coreward-Spinward by the remaining Great Houses, crossed
known space into the utter Rimward, where they found sympathetic locals
and established the New Terran Republic (NTR) - far from Terra itself.

The year is 2551 and the former Terran Empire lies in ruins. But out of
the chaos, new opportunities arise for the brave, the enterprising and
the opportunistic. Whether they serve one of the old Great Houses, align
themselves with a warlord or Oligarch, join the Republican cause or
strike out in their own, player characters have a chance for fame, glory
and empire-building.

Technology is Traveller TL12 at best for most post-Imperial factions.
The Empire was late TL13. The Reticulan Technate are early TL14; the old
Reticulan State was TL16.

Tuesday, February 4, 2014

Just a heads up: Barrowmaze, the old-school fantasy megadungeon by Greg Gillespie, which has already been published in two volumes, is now on a crowdfunding campaign on Indiegogo to fund an expanded edition, containing both parts of the dungeon, as well as an entire new village and additional barrow mounds. Custom 28mm miniatures are also planned. Knowing how good Barrowmaze already is, I backed this in a heartbeat!

Monday, February 3, 2014

On January 21st, 2014, I tried to order the CT and JTAS CDs from the Far
Future Enterprises web-store, and the PayPal links there didn't work.
So I e-mailed the contact address, and WITHIN A FEW HOURS got a reply
from Marc Miller, including a PayPal invoice for the purchase. I paid
immediately, and the next day my order has shipped. It reached the
post-office (in Israel) on Thursday, January 30th, and I picked it up
today - very fast shipping. Packaging was very good and well-padded, and
as an added bonus I got a patent of Nobility, a Traveller d6, and a
Traveller Cr25 coin. Excellent service!

So how do the people of Laana (capital world of the Liberated Worlds in my Alkonost setting) dress like? The way I imagine them is along the lines of this illustration from the old Traveller Book:

The main difference from this picture would be the fact that the Laanese, due to genetic drift, usually have a deletion mutation in their hair pigments, leading to white hair. Also, if they're living outside the equatorial canyons, they usually carry a filter mask on them (though they don it only outside) due to the low air pressure and massive amounts of dust on most of their worlds (think a half-terraformed Mars).

Also, Rebel Minis' Sahadeen look similar:

The clothing style is semi-military, owing to the prolonged guerilla war the Laanese has waged against the Incunablis Machine Empire's occupation of Laana (ended a generation ago), though the military uniforms and similar clothes tend to be quite informal and practical. Comfortable, utilitarian paramilitary clothing is also what the highly popular Chairwoman Ameena wears, adding further to their popularity on Laana and among counter-culture groups on Alkonost who are influenced by the Laanese culture and politics.

Traveller Fair Use Notice

The Traveller game in all forms is owned by Far Future Enterprises. Copyright 1977 - 2014 Far Future Enterprises. Traveller is a registered trademark of Far Future Enterprises. Far Future permits web sites and fanzines for this game, provided it contains this notice,that Far Future is notified, and subject to a withdrawal of permission on 90 days notice. The contents of this site are for personal, non-commercial use only. Any use of Far Future Enterprises's copyrighted material or trademarks anywhere on this web site and its files should not be viewed as a challenge to those copyrights or trademarks. In addition, any program/articles/file on this site cannot be republished or distributed without the consent of the author who contributed it.